Base of Operations: Currently, the ravaged earth of a far future; previously an unspecified city on what appears to be the United States of the time; was created at the royal palace of Asgard, but left for Earth moments later, never to return.

First Appearance: Thor I#191 (August, 1971)

Powers/Abilities: Incredible resilience and strength - class 75 at the very least. His tactics grasp was considerable, despite his lack of experience and of language. Had the ability of blasting some sort of (apparently concussive) energy from his hands in straight lines, with enough power to put the Silver Surfer down after a number of blasts.

Weaknesses: Durok was completely mute and incapable of communication except through physical violence. Also, he literally had no purpose in existence other than destroying everything in sight.

History: (Thor I#191) - Having recently snatched the under protected Odinring and therefore being the legitimate ruler of Asgard for the moment, Loki ordered Odin to fall asleep and a bit later convinced Karnilla the Queen of Nornheim to create an humanoid being capable of destroying Thor. That she did, but warned that even her powerful magic could not make such a being actually come alive. Loki anticipated that and, after christening the indestructible warrior as "Durok the Demolisher" ("for demolishing shall be your mission") employed the power he held by way of the Odinring to make the creature alive.

Moments later, Thor entered the room and threw himself over Durok. Loki, however, decided to mystically teleport Durok to "a place where he will bring lots of destruction" - naturally enough, Earth. Quite predictably, Thor anguished for a moment and followed in pursuit - just as Loki hoped he would.

(Thor I#192) - Thor engaged Durok in battle and despite his grim determination did not manage much more than a stalemate against the creature of destruction. Meanwhile, Balder convinced Karnilla to transport the two of them to Earth's surface, vowing not to fight against Durok - since, as Karnilla pointed out, Balder had vowed allegiance to her at the time and she did not want to destroy Durok. On arrival, Balder unsheathed his sword and brandished it in order to make "a signal - a signal to the skies, since that is where he who can help the Thunder God may be found". The sign went unanswered, so the duo traveled to the top of Mount Everest - the highest point on Earth - for a second try. Karnilla wondered if Balder was hoping to ask for Odin's help, and reminded him that Odin was still subject to his legendary sleep. Balder explained that the being whose help he hoped to get was "not Odin - one from neither Earth nor Asgard". Karnilla was skeptic about the existence of such a being, but Balder's summons were then finally answered by the Silver Surfer, as he came swiftly their way.

(Thor I#193) - The Silver Surfer was somewhat bitter with mankind and did not really want to help. Balder pressed the matter and Karnilla became quite envious of Balder's loyalty to Thor (she saw it as defiance to the vow of allegiance to her) and reacted viciously, nearly killing Balder by smothering him with magically levitated earth. Surfer did not accept that violence well and turned against Karnilla, who reacted in vain and soon enough decided to obey the Surfer and let Balder free. Surfer healed Balder, who anguished a bit about failing to get help to Thor. Surfer explained that on the contrary, Balder's loyalty inspired him to go help Thor.

At this point, Durok and Thor had sparred for a while already, and Thor lay unconscious at a water duct when Surfer finally caught up with the two of them. Realizing that Thor was unconscious Surfer mentally commanded his board to hold Durok to a wall while he examined Thor. At first he thought that Thor was dead, but soon enough decided that he kept a "spark of life" that could be made to blossom by means of his Power Cosmic. That he did, and after a brief conversation he decided to deal with Durok and let Thor return to Asgard to deal with Loki.

Fighting Durok, however, proved to be not much easier for the Surfer than it was for Thor. After demolishing the wall which he was tied to, Durok battled Surfer furiously, managing to down him and even destroy his board. Surfer, however, simply emanated beams of Power Cosmic from his eyes, catched the fragments of the board with them, rebuilt it and stood up to follow Durok again. They traded blows a bit more. The Surfer was ill at ease with Durok's silence, but decided that it did not really matter, since he was now travelling with Durok on his board at a speed greater than that of light, arriving at a desolate future Earth "after a millennium of battles". After declaring that he did not know nor did he really care about what exactly happened to Earth, he proclaimed that a being devoted to destruction shall be left on a destroyed Earth - "forever!"

(Thor II#82)- Durok was among the forces assembled by Loki in his conquest of Asgard, and joined with trolls, giants and the Fenris Wolf in assaulting Vanaheim. Durok struck Valkyrie from the sky and attempted to kill Sif, but Sif stabbed him with Valkyrie's sword Dragonfang, as Thor wielded the Fenris Wolf himself against Durok as a weapon. With Mjolnir broken, Thor found that he had to call upon power from within himself to face Durok, and ultimately killed Durok.

Comments: Created by Stan Lee and John Buscema, banished to a ravaged Earth by Gerry Conway's pen.

I quote a lot in this profile, but since I am going by memory from a brazilian portuguese translation I am pretty sure there are mistakes. If anyone has an exact quote to substitute, I will be thankful.

Durok is actually quite smart; he once jumped from Surfer's board to a nearby obelisk and made his way to the surface by
sliding down. In fact, I fear neither Thor nor Surfer looked too bright while fighting him.

#192 was the last Stan Lee issue of Thor. #193 was written by the controversial Gerry Conway. I don't have the issues at hand to check, but I think it was Conway who first showed Durok's power of generating concussion blasts from his hands.

Balder and Thor had already met the Silver Surfer at least once, @ Silver Surfer Vol. I #4 where Loki manipulated and mystically strengthened Surfer against Thor. The situation was clarified, but Loki managed to banish Surfer from Asgard at that very moment, avoiding his
embarrassing testimony.

While not depicted, it seems safe to assume that the Silver Surfer returned to his present just after banishing Durok to the future. This is another one of those occasions when Surfer travelled to the far future without apparently even thinking about checking to see if the barrier that Galactus used to imprison him on Earth still existed at that time.

Jean-Marc Lofficier once wrote an unpublished story that helps in abridging the attitude gap between the disenchanted Silver Surfer of this point in time with the more upbeat version that we saw not much later at Fantastic Four #121-123 (where he helped the team against Gabriel the Air-Walker and Galactus) and Defenders #2-on (where he faced Calizuma). His previous appearances at Silver Surfer V1 #18 and Sub-Mariner #34-35 actually had him very bitter with mankind. Ironically, the Sub-Mariner story line had him teaming up with both Namor and Hulk in the so-called proto-Defenders team - and they had to fight an Avengers roster that included Thor!

Loki did not keep the Odinring for long; the next issue of Thor revealed that it does not grant power as much as canalizes it from its wearer. As a result, Loki began to have fits of weakness even as he fought Thor one-on-one. Soon he had no choice but to discard the Odinring, which was immediately recovered by Odin (who had just been awakened by Hogun). One dangling point is the fact that Loki managed to make Durok (an empty shell up to that point) into an actual living being by using the Odinring. I do not think we are meant to assume that Loki is normally capable of creating life, but rather that he spent an inordinate amount of his own life force when he brought Durok to life.

Profile by Luis Dantas

Clarifications: Durok is not connected with anyone at all except for his foes and his creators (Loki and Karnilla), and should not be confused with any of the multitude of other big, strong and tough guys we occasionally see in comics. Besides being completely mute, he is easily recognizable by virtue of never appearing anywhere else but in those three issues of Thor.

Deathlok the Demolisher, Luther Manning, cyborg soldier and time-traveller, a native of the alternate timeline of
Earth-Deathlok, was the product of Project: Alpha Mech,
and transformed into a Cyborg by Hellinger, @ Astonishing
Tales#25, despite the two of them being
tough types who don't like to talk much, enjoy time-travelling and staying
at dystopian war-ravaged futures. Deathlok is slated to get a full profile fairly soon. He has also got a cadre of clones and alternate timeline versions - see below or look at the Appendix clarifications.

Hellinger's Luther Manning clone,
from Earth-Deathlok, which was converted into the first
of his Doomsday Mechs,
@ Astonishing Tales#33

The CIA's Luther Manning clone,
also from Earth-Deathlok, which was given the memories of
Deathlok the Demolisher. It is this clone which was sent
to Earth-616 to retrieve Deathlok the Demolisher, @
Astonishing Tales#34, Captain America I#287